THERE HAD BEEN a shadow, half seen, more sensed than anything which had startled the dog. Yet to the maid it was as if she were the reason for the creature's alarm. For dogs loved her usually and she them. Was she tainted by the burden she carried? Did the mongrel sense this?
'Now that is an aroma I like,' the taller girl said with a pleased snort. 'A perfume guaranteed to chase away all mangey curs in an instant.' She finished off her meal, one Vetta persuaded her to buy to end an unnecessary diet, scrunched up the wrapper and made a show of tossing it into the nearest bin, missing by around five yards. The paper ball bounced once or twice and then was retrieved with startling agility by the other girl. Having secured it, she placidly walked up to the bin and dropped it in, checking unnecessarily that indeed it nestled safely there.
'Well done Vetta. You're like a trained animal. All that running about must keep you fit,' the other girl said.
'Pirouette, you know very well good health is one of the five wellsprings of joy,' the girl said, returning to the side of her companion and showing no signs of exasperation at cleaning up after her.
'Only because you keep saying it over and over and over, like recycled cast offs from last year's fashion display.'
'Repetition my father says, is a good way to learn things and education is one of the five wellsprings of joy.'
The other snarled impatiently at this and began walking off as if their odd friendship had been sundered by this last sally.
The maid stood there, a little agog at the odd display.
What was it the child had said? Something about joy. A commodity rare in her world at present.
The girl called Vetta noticed her standing there.
'Hello,' she said and smiled. 'I am Vetta Mindal from the Blessed Hub of Poldorama.'
'Ah, that explains something, I think,' Soopsie replied with a cough on hearing this quaint pronouncement. Vetta stood there, still smiling. There was a kind of expectancy about her, a kind of sucking, absorbing pressure, like a gravity well. She just stood there, blinked a couple of times and smiled.
'Tell me, in truth,' Soopsie was compelled to say, 'is there joy in honesty?' Her voice trembled a bit as she said this.
A tiny frown formed on the young face. It was a lovely face in its way, so open and friendly, yet that frown appeared and Soopsie felt even more guilty, like she had corrupted a pure soul.
'Truth, papa says, is the foundation of all words,' Vetta said carefully. Then she frowned again. 'Are you-?' came a softly spoken and half-formed question before she was interrupted.
'Hey, why are you just standing there?' the taller girl, Pirouette, said, returning with hasty strides. 'Come on, let's get back. You know you shouldn't be talking to strangers anyway,' and she pulled the smaller girl away by the hand.
The last thing Soopsie heard before the girls disappeared around a curve in the walkway was a protest from the little blonde creature.
'There are no strangers,' she insisted calmy, and then she was gone.
Soopsie took a few deep breaths and then returned to her bench, where a heavy gloom resumed its effective task of blotting out light and warmth from a troubled soul.